When my daughter had just turned 7, she asked for us to build a puzzle box that only she could open. She drew up her projections here:
That was almost 4 years ago. We brainstormed, tweaked designed (and re-designed) a puzzle box together and finally produced this:
Here’s the youtube walkthrough on how to open it
We learned so many new techniques. Almost exclusively built with our glowforge and 3d printer (Zortrax m200).
Lots of fun!
UPDATE:
Thanks everyone for the great advice! I’ve decided to just publish the Fusion plans for anyone who wants. If you use it, please send me a picture.
Maybe I’ll design another that’s easier to manufacture.
Here’s the fusion drawing:
You’ll also need various springs, polarized film, lots of M3 and M4 machine screws. Feel free to contact me if anyone has questions
And I’ve updated the youtube video to show the lens mechanism a bit better …
UPDATE 2:
Here are some notes of materials and tools I used:
Baltic birch veneer, self adhesive
1/8" baltic birch plywood
1/4" MDF
1/8" acrylic
For inner box, 1/4" baltic birch plywood
3D printed parts (I used HIPS, 40% infill)
Fasteners:
Assorted M3 screws (I use hex socket heads)
Some assorted M2 and M4 screws
Many small #3 tapping screws. I used these: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01GBLNBOI
wood glue, super glue
acrylic glue for plastic to wood bonds
epoxy for holding conical spring to spring plate behind the sun drawer
Bearings:
9.5mm steel bearing ball for marble maze, and behind moon rotating plate
5mm steel bearings to support lid rotating plate
5x13mmx5 bearings (I used these: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07X9T9JKM)
For the marble maze’s inner pieces, I used some thin (~2mm?) brass rods. Just a few inches total.
Magnets:
10x3 round neodymium magnets
Some smaller magnets for the moon release. I used 1/4" dia, 1/8" thick neodymium (https://www.kjmagnetics.com/proddetail.asp?prod=D42)
Springs:
I used a number of compression and extension springs from this assortment:
1.25" long ~2lb/in conical spring (I got from mcmaster carr)
I used small rubber bands for the sun puzzle’s posts
TOOLS:
- Fusion360
- Shaper Utilities plugin to export to SVG
- Fusion’s built in STL exporter for 3d prints
- For when I needed kerf compensation done well, I used the Colorific post processor for fusion (video here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=54FLff9zlQ0&feature=youtu.be)
- Also check out Fusion’s new manufacturing model and auto layout for lasers/cncs. I started making use of that too
I’ll add more as I think of it …
j/k Seriously that is really amazing work. A lot of thought and detail went into that!! Nice
but what an excellent accomplishment.
